Before buying AI, businesses need to ask better questions

A recent analysis encouraged Ghanaian entrepreneurs to connect artificial intelligence with practical needs, including customer communication and record-keeping. That is a useful starting point, but it leaves another question: how should a business choose the company providing the technology?

A convincing demonstration should begin a discussion, not end it. Before committing money or uploading customer information, owners need to understand what a service delivers, what remains their responsibility, and how they can leave if it disappoints.

Request a Demonstration of Your Actual Work

Consider a hypothetical printing business in Kumasi comparing two services for preparing quotations. Instead of accepting a supplier's polished examples, the owner could provide a fictional order and an approved price list.

Ask each provider to complete the same task. Include an unavailable paper size, an unclear delivery instruction and a request for an unauthorised discount. Observe whether the system asks questions or invents answers.

Keep the expected result beside the output. Check calculations independently rather than accepting a fluent explanation as evidence.

Also ask whether a spreadsheet or standard template would solve the problem. The purpose is to improve a business process, not buy an AI feature merely because it is fashionable.

Let an employee who missed the sales presentation repeat the exercise using only the supplied instructions. If routine work still depends on the vendor's representative, include the additional training and support required in your evaluation and budget before giving the wider team access.

Establish What Happens to Your Information

Before uploading real records, ask where information is processed, how long it is retained and whether it is used to train models. Request answers covering the particular subscription under consideration.

The UK's National Cyber Security Centre recommends assessing external AI providers and controlling data sent outside an organisation. Its guidance also emphasises limiting access to necessary functions.

For the printing business, an early trial needs neither customer addresses nor unpublished designs. Use fictional examples until appropriate arrangements have been checked.

Ask who can access account history, how departing employees lose access and how deletion requests are handled. Keep the supplier's written commitments alongside your own operating instructions.

Make Clear Communication an Acceptance Test

A useful service should help employees explain the business accurately, not simply produce more words. Teams hoping to humanize AI drafts should preserve prices, deadlines and conditions while improving readability.

Compare a revised quotation with the source document. Has a possible delivery date become a guarantee? Has the deposit requirement disappeared?

OWASP identifies convincing but inaccurate information as a risk in language model applications and recommends verification against trusted sources.

Test messages with the staff who answer customer questions. Where communication involves Twi or another Ghanaian language, include competent speakers rather than judging only the English version.

Ask the supplier how corrections are applied. A mistake should lead to a documented improvement, not another employee repeatedly fixing the same sentence.

Look for Evidence Behind Security Promises

Where an AI-enabled website or business integration needs independent assessment, choose a penetration testing company authorised to provide the relevant services in Ghana. The Cyber Security Authority's licensing framework explicitly includes vulnerability assessment and penetration testing.

Verify the provider's certificate through the authority's verification portal rather than relying on a logo in a proposal.

Agree the scope, written permission, reporting process and arrangements for checking repairs. Do not authorise tests against a supplier's infrastructure without its permission.

Ask what was tested and when. The NCSC cautions that a penetration test provides assurance at a particular time, not a permanent guarantee. Security claims should describe evidence and limitations, not promise invulnerability.

Calculate the Cost Beyond the Subscription

Compare offers using the same workload and number of staff. Ask about setup, training, storage, support, usage limits and charges for connecting other business systems.

The NCSC notes that differently priced cloud licences can include different security features. Confirm that essential protections are included in the quoted package.

Record the time employees spend reviewing outputs and correcting mistakes. Faster drafting is not necessarily faster completion.

Check the billing currency and renewal conditions, then ask how price changes will be communicated. Avoid committing to an annual package before a manageable trial has shown value.

Require a clear support route. Identify who responds when something fails and what assistance is actually included.

Ask for a demonstration of exporting records in a usable format. Check whether templates, attachments and relevant history leave with them, rather than assuming that a download contains everything.

Keep an independent copy of essential business information. Agree how work will continue during an outage and who can suspend automated actions.

Before renewal, compare results with the original problem. Has quotation preparation become more reliable? Are customers asking fewer clarification questions? Can employees explain and correct the output?

For Ghanaian businesses, successful adoption should strengthen control rather than surrender it. The right supplier is not necessarily the one with the most impressive presentation. It is the one whose promises can be tested, whose responsibilities are clear and whose service remains worth paying for.